Page 134 of Slick Handling

Meow.

He won’t let me spiral out in the pity party that I’m holding for myself. He’s trying to get us to rally. To save his Omega.

How do we rally when the sun was stolen from our sky?

“Apollo baby,” My Mama wraps her arm around me, “You and the others need to sleep. She’s been gone for almost 24 hours now. You all have been awake this entire time.” She swallows and looks around the room and scoots close to mer, “Clover is going to be going into heat any day now. She will need a strong pack to take care of her.”

She’s trying to motivate me to take care of myself, but all I heard was Clover’s going into heat.

She’s in danger.

She can’t go into heat when she is in danger like this.

What if they bond with her?

A growl rips through me and I snap out.

“Snap at your Mama again and I’ll muzzle you.” Mother points at me. Her eyes darting over to her Omega beside me to make sure she’s okay, “The police are closing in. If you don’t sleep you won’t be able to take care of her when she will need you the most.”

I didn’t take care of her.

This is all my fault.

Clover wasn’t safe because I prioritized another Omega over her.

The morning after she had given herself to us and I had ignored her because I had to take care of things.

I should have at least checked in with her first.

What if she was in pain?

What if she had wanted to talk about what happened the night before?

What if she needed reassurance and I hadn’t been enough to give it to her?

I wasn’t fit to be her Alpha.

“You should all get her nest ready. Maybe if you all sleep in there, when she comes home she will feel better? Having your scents saturating her sheets will make her nesting go much betters” Marcus offers this and I’m so upset that he’s here.

He needs to be safe. I know that.

Clover deserves to be safe too.

“C’mon, O.” McKinley is reaching for me and I see him giving a look to Griffin to get Vaughn.

I’m numb as I’m led upstairs. McKinley strips me down as I stand in Clover’s room, looking around the space and thinking about how we had just gotten to spend time together in here. We were supposed to have more time together.

Now she was taken from me.

“It hurts, Mick.” He pauses, stripping off his own shirt to look at me. His eyes on me as he nods his head, tears threatening to spill out as I wrap my arms around myself. “She was hurt by me. It’s my fault that she ran away.” I whisper it out, feeling the shame wash over me.

Griffin grunts as he pushes Vaughn in the nest before he wraps his arm around my waist.

“It’s not your fault, Apollo. We’re a pack. We communicate together and we love together. We should have addressed everything together. Always us. All of us means Clover too.” He gives me a squeeze before getting into the nest and nuzzling into a pillow instead of a person.

If he’s not cuddling and choosing to use an object to replace our Omega then Griffin isn’t holding it together as much as he’s pretending to..

The Omega who I didn’t-

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